


beautiful as it always was

by Glitteringworlds



Category: Dragalia Lost (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Euden+Dragons, F/F, Future!Zethia Shenanigans, Gen, Halidom Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Multiple, Pining, Sickfic, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2020-02-16 11:07:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18690253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glitteringworlds/pseuds/Glitteringworlds
Summary: Zethia has never stopped fighting for the people she loves - but time travel is a tricky business, and a kingdom at war can't be fixed with just one right choice.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ah, the tragedy of longfic for a still updating story - this is an AU from the end of chapter 6 of the campaign onwards, because that's all that was around when I first started writing! Some elements from later chapters may be incorporated, but I make no promises. Currently updating every other week.

Sinoa hated being left behind. Oh, there had been a time she hadn’t really minded it much - she was a scientist first and foremost after all, not a fighter, whatever Euden claimed. But then Luca had come back with a broken leg after a mission to help one of the sylvan villages, and a month later she’d heard Ranzal sharing the story of a fiend’s razor claws missing his face by mere centimeters, and she had started to notice how long Cleo would sleep after particularly hard battle, bone-tired from using her healing to pull her friends back from the brink, and - the waiting was worse and worse each time. She had always had a weakness for “what if’s,” and it felt as if the two words had built a nest in her brain some nights, tapping away at the inside of her skull like a woodpecker.

Of course, usually when Sinoa was left behind, she didn’t walk into her lab to find a beautiful, slightly disheveled woman wearing skin tight clothing and looking around blearily.

“Uh, hello?” Sinoa held her latest research journal tight against her chest as she took a heistent step into the room. The woman snapped her head towards the noise. Her long blonde hair had fallen in front of her face, and partially obscured her eyes, but it did nothing to temper the intensity of her gaze, which was icy and focused. Even so, Sinoa recognized the dark circles and tight-lipped grimace of someone pushed to their limit. She’d had more than a few sleepless nights in the lab herself.

The woman leaned forward, putting her weight on a golden staff as she slowly got to her feet, holding eye contact with Sinoa the whole time. Or at least trying to. It only took about a second before Sinoa started to feel twitchy under her scrutiny, as she cast about for something else for focus on. The lab seemed mostly untouched, aside from the Mystery Woman.

“You… you don’t recognize me, do you.” It wasn’t a question. It took Sinoa a second to process that. It wasn’t a question? It sort of sounded like it should be a question, but it wasn’t. But why would it be a question? Sinoa was pretty sure she would remember meeting someone dressed like that.

“I don’t think so?”

“Well,” the Mystery Woman said with a sigh, slumping against her staff. “That’s something. And it looks like I didn’t blow up your lab, either.”

“Oh, it’s very fireproof, if you’re worried about that. The Waterwyrm let me use some of her mana to enchant it, after I almost blew up the castle a few times. You’d be amazed what you can do with a Greatwyrm’s mana. Not that I know much, either, really. Most of them aren’t very generous with it.” Sinoa paused. “Well, none of them are, really. I’m Sinoa, by the way.”

The Mystery Woman had a crooked sort of grin, even tired as she was. “I know. But I need to-”

And then she tipped over, her golden staff skittering across the floor as Sinoa stumbled forward and just barely managed to catch her. She slumped against Sinoa, warm and surprisingly relaxed, and Sinoa could just make her muttering something about Euden.

“The Prince isn’t here right now, I’m sorry. But you need rest, and probably a healer, whoever… you are.”

If she heard anything, she gave no further response.

* * *

Sinoa took more time than she’d like to admit moving her potions and half-built machinery off one of her lab tables to make room for the Mystery Woman to lie down. It was delicate equipment, she reasoned, and an explosion now would probably be especially bad. The fact that it would cost a lot of money to recreate some of the more delicate features only played a very minor part in her decisions. Besides, the woman seemed well enough. She had a slight fever, maybe, and her rest was fitful and twitchy as Sinoa finally hauled her unceremoniously onto the table. She didn’t seem to be in dire straits at least, but Sinoa still wanted to find a healer, or anyone else who might know what had happened.

Once she was sure that the woman wouldn't roll off and fall back onto the floor, Sinoa scrambled out the door, looking for signs of life on the Halidom grounds. It was a cool spring evening, much warmer than it would have been even a couple of weeks before, but not warm enough to melt the last of the snow piled up against the outside of buildings and the high outer walls. Not warm enough that there were many people out this late into the evening.

Sinoa began to head towards the castle, but only got a few steps before the sound of giggles caught her attention, jarring amidst the quiet of the evening. Doubling back, she cast around for the source. There, by the cluster of trees above the cliff - two dark clumps of giggling shadow, crouched on the ground. One was bundled up, a thick scarf swallowing half their face. The second was much more easily recognizable as Lily, even from this far away. No one else walked around dressed like that this time of year. Well, some of the sylvans might have. But the sparkle of the outfit was a dead giveaway for Lily.

"Hey, you two!" One of the figures jumped a bit at Sinoa's voice. For a moment, Sinoa stared in confusion as they scooped something off the ground and tucked it into their scarf. This kid was even weirder than Lily if they were running around shoveling snow down their shirt.

No, not snow, it must have been a mouse. Sinoa recognized Pia as she approached, even though the girl stayed partly ducked behind Lily. It was rather adorable, really, since Pia was at least a couple of inches taller, and was wearing an assortment of warm clothes that made her stand out even more from behind the dress that Lily wore.

"Is something wrong?" Lily frowned at Sinoa's presumably bewildered expression, peering around as if to find the source of her distress.

Sinoa scrunched up her face. "It's complicated. Do either of you know where one of the healers is? I really need-"

"Pia knows!" Pia squeaked as Lily pulled her forward, as if to proudly display her friend. "She was just saying today how much she likes to sing along with Vixel when he plays the piano. She said he's very nice but a little intimidating."

"Right, great," Sinoa cut in before Lily could pick up more momentum. "Pia, do you know where his room is? Could you go get him for me?"

It took Pia a second to realize Sinoa was talking to her, but once she understood she was needed for something, she resolutely pulled her gaze away from the ground. "His room is in the back tower. It's pretty far but I go there sometimes to practice with him."

"Great, great." Sinoa gave Pia what she hoped was an approving smile. "Tell him that I have someone who needs tending to at my lab. That's the blue building right over there." Turning to point it out, Sinoa looked back to see Pia nodding resolutely.

"Right. I'm on it." Pia made to take off running, but pulled up short a few steps later, reaching carefully into her scarf to pull out the mouse. Sinoa had only seen Pia in passing, but she seemed to have the mouse with her everywhere she went. Now, though, she held him out in her cupped hands to Lily. "Will you keep Mr. Mouse safe for me?"

Lily nodded solemnly, with all the intensity of a knight accepting a quest from her queen. As soon as the white little fluffball had made the transfer into Lily's hands, Pia was off like an arrow, almost stumbling as she rounded the corner, but just managing to catch herself and keep going out of sight.

Shaking her head a little, Sinoa sighed and tried not to worry too much about how serious some of the kids around here were. Instead, she turned her attention to Lily, who was gently scratching the very content looking Mr. Mouse between his eyes. "I'm going back to my lab to check on her," Sinoa explained. "Do you want to come with?"

"The person who needs help?"

"Yeah, that one."

Lily nodded, falling in next to Sinoa as she walked briskly back to the lab, trying her best to look like she had everything under control. The lab was really just one big room, a former storage building towards the edge of the Halidom that had been cleared out for Sinoa's purposes. To her credit, she hadn't blown it up yet. Okay, there were a few more scorch marks now than there had been before, but she was still doing pretty well.

The room was dim, only lit by a handful of candles around the central work table, the one that the Mystery Woman now occupied. "I'll light a lantern," Sinoa muttered in Lily's direction as they entered. "Sorry that it's so dark."

Lily didn't respond. In fact, Lily hadn't moved from the doorway, Sinoa realized, as she glanced over from the pile of junk she was rummaging through. She slowly pulled out the lantern that she had been looking for, and then turned to follow Lily's gaze, trying to piece together what had pulled the girl up short. Okay, sure, the woman was a little unsettling, dressed all in dark colors as she was, with the horns and everything, but she was just sleeping peacefully.

"Lily, it's alright. She's just... well, I don't know who she is, but I don't think she's going to hurt anyone. Especially not in the state she's in."

Shaking herself out of her daze, Lily took a few hesitant steps forward. "I'm not scared. It's just... isn't that the Auspex?"

"The... _what_?"

"Well, Euden has a twin sister, and she-"

Sinoa shook her head, waving her hands impatiently back and forth in front of her. "No, I know who the Auspex is, I heard about her, about what happened to her, but why is she here? Why is this her? Is it? It can't be, right?"

Lily just shrugged her small shoulders, giving Mr. Mouse a pet on fluffy head. "I only met her once or twice before she was... before what happened." She looked at the mouse while she spoke, seemingly not wanting to think about it too much. Sinoa had arrived after the Halidom had been properly founded as New Alberia, long after Euden's sister - after Zethia - had been taken. She'd picked up the story, more or less, but that still didn't explain why the Auspex was here, in Sinoa's lab, looking like that. Ilia's underclothes, wasn't everyone out right this second looking for her? The details of the mission were secret, but Sinoa was fairly sure she'd heard mutterings of Zethia being spotted in some ruins somewhere or another. So did this mean they had found her? Surely this was a good sign, right?

"Is she okay?" Lily had finally come into the room, and she stood next to Sinoa now, looking at the sleeping Mystery... Zethia. Sinoa wasn't sure what to say. Honestly, she didn't totally know herself how okay the woman was.

"I'm not sure. She has a fever I think, and whatever she's been through, it's worn her out. She needs rest." _And to be looked after by someone who knows more than me_ , Sinoa added in her head.

Taking a few more steps forward, Lily laid a hand on Zethia's bare arm. "I can help a little with the fever, if that's okay." There was a tone of what Sinoa could only think was reverence in her voice. She wondered what Zethia had been to Lily, before she'd been taken by the Other. Sinoa had heard stories about the Auspex's calming presence, and the way her words inspired. "I think that would be good, Lily. Just be careful not to put her on ice."

Lily only acknowledged that last comment by turning to Sinoa and scrunching up her face. She then focused back on her task, letting cool, mana-charged air flow out from her hands and around Zethia. Frost crept along the edges of the table, but Zethia herself seemed to relax at the touch of cold, her face smoothing and settling into a less uneasy expression.

Lily let out a small sigh. "She seems a little better now."

"She does," Sinoa said, feeling a small weight lift off her own shoulders. Whatever was happening with Zethia, Euden and his friends would surely be back soon to explain it. Sinoa would see that she was taken care of for now. That would be enough.

And with that, the night ripped itself apart.

The noise was brutal. It was a roar, Sinoa was fairly certain, though it sounded as much like a scream as a roar. It was the sound of something in pain, and the only something around here big enough to make that kind of noise was a-

"Zodiark."

Zethia had already pushed herself half to sitting, ignoring Lily and staring instead at the still open door outside. "He... I'm too late. I'm too late again." She slammed a fist into the table, making both Sinoa and Lily jump, and then winced in pain.

The roar came again, tearing through the sky overhead, along with the sound of beating wings. Zethia wasn't moving now, seemingly locked in her own thoughts. Which was a shame, because Sinoa really would have liked to know what she knew, right now. But if that wasn't going to happen, she'd just go find out for herself.

"Stay with her, Lily. I'm going to see what's happening."

Sinoa made to leave, but a tug at her skirt stopped her. Lily looked close to tears, holding the mouse in one hand, and a handful of Sinoa's skirt in the other. "Listen, Lily, it's okay. I just need to see what's happening."

Lily nodded, but didn't let go. She held the mouse out towards Sinoa. "Mr. Mouse can go get help, if you need it."

Sighing, Sinoa held out her hand. Lily carefully lifted her passenger up, prodding him forward. It was a painfully slow process amidst the noise outside, and as soon as she had the fluffball, Sinoa tucked him against her stomach and raced out the door.

The alarm was just being raised as she made it outside, the whole Halidom stirring in confusion and fear. But unlike everyone else scrambling to prepare for whatever emergency had struck them, Sinoa knew what to look for. Zodiark's bone white outline cut across the sky overhead, circling in unsteady flight. He looked like he was in pain, or fighting against something, starting to descend, and then roaring again and pulling back up.

As Sinoa watched, he circled the Halidom one last time, and with a final desperate scream, turned himself towards the horizon.

And just like that, the air fell silent, and Zodiark disappeared into the night.


	2. Chapter 2

Sarisse nearly fell out of her tree at the first roar. She had been settled in the branches of a tall, rather grandfatherly sort of oak just outside the Halidom walls, fussing over the fletching on her arrows and keeping half an eye on the road leading out of the woods. She wasn't on watch, had never been assigned watch and never intended to be, but she still liked to keep an eye out anyway, some nights. Still, she wasn't prepared for a dragon to go screeching through the sky overhead.

After dropping the arrow she had been holding and pushing back against the trunk to steady herself, Sarisse slid her quiver around to her back, and, looping her bow over one shoulder, picked her way to the top of the tree. There was certainly something circling over the castle, though that much had kind of already been obvious by all the racket it was making. It had to be a dragon, but was it one of theirs, or some other jerk trying to attack them? Surely if it was an attack, the dragons at the Halidom would be rising up to defend their turf, right?

As the alarm was raised along the walls, Sarisse felt for the warmth in her chest that signaled Brunhilda's power. It was there, faintly, like a second heartbeat alongside her own, and for a moment, she considered trying to dip into that well of power and and take to the skies herself. But then, she could only be a dragon for so long. And plummeting down from the heavens after trying to tussle with another dragon didn't sound like a very pleasant experience. There was a reason they all stayed firmly on the ground while fighting in their transformed state, after all.

Instead, Sarisse looked back to the ground, preparing to jump down. Maybe someone inside the walls would know what was happening. They certainly looked like they could use some help, at least. Throwing one last glance down the road she'd been watching all night, Sarisse frowned. There were people on the road now, and something about that worried her. Something about the timing. They weren't soldiers at least - the Empire was so obsessed with rank and file that Sarisse could spot them marching a mile away. No, they had to be Euden's group, but they were moving slowly, and as Sarisse noticed them, she also noticed someone ahead of them, broken off from the main group and running full-tilt towards the castle.

"Luca?"

Ears drooping, Sarisse swung herself down from the tree, standing awkwardly at the side of the road in wait of her brother. She didn't have to wait long. If the circumstances had been different, she would have scolded him for making so much noise. Sylvans were supposed to be as quiet as the creaking a tree and the sigh of its leaves, or so she'd been told by the village elder. Luca sounded more like the snapping of broken branches.

"Luca?" Sarisse asked, louder now, not shouting, but hoping to get his attention before he barreled past her. She could just make him out in the darkness as he pulled up short, looking around for her.

"Sarisse? Where are you?" He sounded out of breath.

Sighing, Sarisse jogged over to him, resisting the urge to make a sister-sneak-attack. He looked tired, and as she got closer she could see that he had his fair share of cuts and bruises. That wasn't good. Cleo usually healed the group before they traveled. There must have been some kind of emergency. "What happened?"

When he spotted her, Luca didn't waste a moment. He closed the rest of the distance and pulled Sarisse into a tight hug, his shoulders sagging around her. Then, just as quickly, he pulled away, only just holding onto her arms. "I don't really have time to explain, but something... something's wrong with Euden. We need help, more healers, I don't know."

"Where-" 

Another roar interrupted Sarisse's question, and both of them looked back towards the Halidom. Luca flinched. "Do you know what that is?"

"No clue."

Another roar, and then, making the noise a thousand times worse, there was the sound of a scream down the road. Then again, both voices, synchronized, pained, as if they were reaching out for each other.

And then - silence. The shape over the castle was no longer circling, but fading into the distance, leaving the night empty and cold.

Luca locked eyes with Sarisse, his face serious. "Go get help. Anyone. We will meet you at the castle." Sarisse turned to sprint off, but Luca's grip on her arms pulled her back again. "Wait," he said, shaking is head and scrunching his eyes shut, the way he always did to try and focus himself. "Not just Euden though. Tell them we have Zethia. We have Zethia." He sounded relieved. "We got Zethia, and she's going to need to be looked at too."

For a moment, Sarisse just smiled. It was her turn to pull Luca into a hug, quick and tight, and much more forceful than the one he had given her.

"Okay. I'll tell them."

And then she was off.

* * *

 

Sarisse wasn't surprised to find chaos waiting for her on the other side of the gated walls of the Halidom. She always had trouble focusing in crowds, and this was the crowd to end all crowds, so she kept her head to the ground as she darted towards the castle. Sticking close to the shadowy edges of things helped, but only a bit. The tension rolled up in waves and broke against the Halidom walls, making Sarisse feel a bit like penned-in prey as she glanced over at a huddled mass of people, or caught the eye of a guard rushing past her in the opposite direction. 

A few times, someone tried to stop her, and Sarisse did her best to shrug off their questions. She wasn't sure why they thought she of all people would have any answers for them. Sarisse had only been at the Halidom on any permanent basis for a little over a month, and yet when she took a sharp left past one of the towering stone arches and almost ran over a bedraggled Ieyasu, he threw up his hands to get her to stop. "Sarisse, right? May I have a word with you?"

Sarisse glowered at him. "Oh, just one?"

Much to her annoyance, he only smiled apologetically in response to her prodding. "Probably quite a few more than that, actually. It's about the dragon that-"

"Oh, the one that flew around here screeching so loud that everyone from here to your home probably heard him? Or was Cupid playing at matchmaking again?" 

"Ah, well-"

"Listen I'm sure you mean well but I kind of have to... to..." What was she doing again? Telling someone that something had happened with Euden? Getting help? She had probably run past 30 different people who were trying to find some way to help. How was she supposed to know which one was the right one to deal with whatever was going on?

Screw it. "Oh, fine, whatever. You'll do." Grabbing Ieyasu's wrist, Sarisse tugged him towards the archway she had just run through. "Something happened with the Prince, they're bringing him back now. Maybe half an hour out still, I'd guess. I don't know what happened with him but we probably should let the guards at the gate know to expect him. Maybe set up some kind of infirmary or something down there." Now that she has stopped to think, her mind was coming up with a hundred things to do all at once. "I'm going to keep heading towards the castle, I think Ranzal is there and he should know what's happening. And hopefully I can find a healer or something." 

Sarisse looked Ieyasu up and down, to make sure he was still listening. He was, amazingly. His previously bleary eyes had snapped into eerie focus as he scanned the forest below. When she stopped talking, he looked back at her, checking to see if she was done. Huh.

"Listen, just... if you see anyone carrying around a magic-looking staff, grab them and take them along with you, okay?"

Ieyasu paused, opened his mouth, closed it, paused again, and finally simply nodded. "As you wish." With that, he seemed almost to melt into the night, moving quickly and carefully back down the way Sarisse had come.

* * *

By the time Sarisse reached the castle, there was quite a crowd that had gathered outside. And though the din of mumbling and concerned whispers was loud, it was easily matched by the even louder voice of Ranzal, who seemed to be standing on a couple of barrels outside the front entrance, doing his best to make any kind of sense out of what had happened. As Sarisse sidled up to the outskirts of the crowd, she could just hear him attempting to answer a question about Euden and the rest of the group that had left several days ago with him.

"-haven't heard back from them, but when the Prince does return, any information he has will be, uh. Publicly announced or somethin'. I know we are all worried about our dragon friends, but as none of us have felt a change in our pacts, we don't have any reason to believe that-"

"But I  _ have _ felt a change," someone shouted, and Sarisse quickly picked out the bright reddish pink of Botan's hair bobbing up and down towards the front of the crowd. "It's felt all fuzzy and just  _ wrong _ , and Ieyasu said-"

Ranzal held up his hands, trying to slow her down, but the murmurs of unease rippled outward even as he tried to keep the calm. "Well, alright, maybe there have been some slight changes, but even so, we can't know what that means so there’s no point in tryin’ to speculate and get all worked up."

Though Botan's harumph wasn't actually audible from as far back as Sarisse was, just seeing her placing her hands on her hips was enough that it might as well have been. This was quickly spiraling into disaster, and however much Sarisse might have hoped things would be as simple as Ranzal taking charge and sorting things out, those delusions flitted out of her head as quickly as a spooked deer springing from a woodland grove. He may have been great at keeping his head during battle, but this was about as far out of his comfort zone as it could get.

Sarisse sighed. She had been standing half in the cover of a large rock just behind the crowd, and before she could think too much about what she was doing, she found her footing on one of the smaller rocks nearby, planted her palms on a relatively flat surface, and hoisted herself up. Scrabbling for a moment to get her feet under her so she could actually stand, Sarisse cleared her throat as soon as she felt confident that she wasn't about to slip off and fall flat on her face in front of everyone.

"Hey, listen up, people!" A few people at the back of the crowd turned to face her. Sarisse scowled, and rapped one end of her bow against the rock. "I said listen. Up." She repeated, louder this time, "unless you just want to stand around being confused some more. I can tell all of you what's going on if you'd just be quiet."

That got some more attention, even if it was a complete lie. Over the tops of the heads turning to face her, Sarisse caught Ranzal mouthing a silent 'thank you' in her direction. Well, that was something, at least. In the brief respite of quiet, Sarisse gathered her thoughts. She didn't know exactly what was going on, but she did know more than these people, at least. She tried to think what Euden would say in a situation like this. He'd tell the truth, but he'd make it gentler too. He'd say something about how it was important to stay calm and have hope and all that jazz. Well, Sarisse could do that, couldn't she?

"I know it's been a chaotic night," Sarisse began, looking not at the crowd, but at Ranzal. It was a bit easier to pretend she was just talking to him. "And the truth is, it's not going to calm down just yet. But that's not because we we are being attacked or anything. I think." A mutter ran through the crowd, and Ranzal shook his head at her. Bad topic. Don't let people think about being attacked. "It's because the Prince and his friends have been busy doing something very important. Some of you may not have met her, but you all know that our Auspex, the Prince's sister, has been missing. She was taken by the Empire, taken over by dark powers. Well, not any more." 

The realization hit Sarisse at about the exact same moment it hit everyone else. Luca had told her that they had Zethia, but she hadn't really thought about what that meant until she said the words aloud. "Zethia is back. Zethia is  _ home _ ."

Taken a moment to gather herself up again, Sarisse pressed her lips together, ignoring the tightness in her throat. "Whatever had to be done to make that happen, it wasn't easy. Euden - the Prince - he is going to need help. I don't know exactly what happened, but it might have something to do with the dragon that flew off earlier. But like, freaking out about it isn't going to help anyone. We have to stay calm, and focus on helping him, and helping the Auspex." Sarisse chewed her lip for a minute, searching for some kind of good way to end her impromptu speech. "I'm sure... I'm sure what Euden would want more than anything right now is for her to feel welcome here."

That seemed to work. The tension wasn't gone, but everyone knew, on some level, how much Zethia meant to Euden, to the kingdom, to the cause. Having her back was something to celebrate, or at least, something bright to cling to amidst everything else that had happened. 

Sarisse saw Ranzal somewhat sheepishly climbing down from his barrels, and he waved her over as she slid down off of her own perch. The crowd was starting to disperse, and Sarisse caught a few whispers about wanting to spread the news. Good for them.

Ranzal gave her a wide smile when she reached him, and after a moment's hesitation, clapped a large hand on her shoulder. "Is that true? About Zethia?"

Despite how tired and on edge she still felt, Sarisse couldn't help but mirror his goofy grin. "What, you don't trust me to know what I'm talking about? Think this is the first time I've run messages?"

"Nah, I believe you kid." His smile fell as quickly as it had appeared. "I guess that means the rest of it is probably true too."

"Yeah."

"Did you... see him? Do you know how bad it is?"

"No, I just heard from Luca that something had happened to him."

"And the dragon?

Sarisse shook her head. "Your guess is as good as mine. I-"

"Pardon me, but did I hear you mention that the Auspex has returned?"

Sarisse turned to see a rather frazzled woman, a monocle balanced precariously on her nose, hair curling out in every direction, and a small white mouse peeking it's nose through her fingers. 

"Sinoa, right? You look different without the, uh. Scorch marks. Anyway, yeah. I don't really know more than that though, so-"

"She didn't... doesn't... know how to teleport or anything, correct?"

Sarisse started blankly. "No?"

"Right, because, I was wondering how she might have ended up in my lab earlier tonight."

"What? She couldn't have been. She was coming with the rest of the group. They are only just arriving like, maybe now. You must be confused."

Sinoa scowled, clearly annoyed at being so flatly contradicted. "Listen, I'm not saying it makes sense, I'm just saying it happened. And is still happening. I left to find someone after Zodiark flew off, but-"

"Wait." Ranzal's voice was quiet behind Sarisse. "what do you mean, how do you know it was Zodiark?"

Glaring over Sarisse's shoulder, Sinoa continued. " _ But _ she seemed to know something about what was going on. She knew it was Zodiark, for one."

"That's not Zethia. I mean, jeez, I mean it  _ is _ Zethia, but she's-"

"Oh my goddess." Sinoa cut off Ranzal, her eyes going wide with what Sarisse couldn't help but notice was more than a little excitement. "By all the hordes of the Greatwyrms. She was in my lab. She was in my lab because I sent her there."

Craning her neck between Sinoa and Ranzal, Sarisse threw up her hands. "Okay, someone want to fill me in here? You sent her to your lab? I thought you said she just appeared there."

The white mouse scampered up Sinoa's arm as she exictedly leaned forward to grab Sarisse's hand. "I didn't send her. I will send her. I will send her back here, in the future, because she's traveled through time."

"It's not the first time, either." Ranzal pinched the bridge of his nose. "And if you're right, we need to find out what's going on. What's happened to Euden."

He began walking quickly down the hill, and both Sarisse and Sinoa sprinted to catch up with him. "Last time I saw her, she was trying to warn us right before Zethia got taken over by the Other and all hell literally broke loose."

"So whatever's going on-”

Ranzal glanced back over his shoulder at Sarisse, nodding. "Is serious."

"Still though." Sinoa muttered, only loud enough that Sarisse could hear. "Time travel. I did it. We did it."

Sarisse glanced over at the woman beside her, who looked... not happy, exactly, but energized. Fascinated. Was she happy about all this? She didn't even know what was happening, what might happen - how bad it might be. "So what?"

Sinoa momentarily looked like she'd been slapped, but she pulled herself together with surprising grace. If anything, she looked more excited after a few moments. "So what? I mean, aside from the obvious scientific implications, the fact that my theory is sound, I have proof my theory is sound, I need to- no, sorry, that's not the point. The point is, I wouldn't have sent her back for no reason. This means we can change things. Whatever has happened, whatever's about to happen. This means we can fight back."


	3. Chapter 3

Elisanne woke to a hand gently shaking her shoulder, and the sound of a soft voice saying her name. It was one of the kinder awakenings she had in her life, though that kindness was set against the ache of her body and a sense of dread nestled in her chest, hovering over her with a watchfulness that hadn't let up even with sleep.

That was the first thing Elly took in - that dread, and the rush of memories that accompanied it. The second thing was the feeling of sunlight on her face. It was morning. Elly opened her eyes.

Ieyasu stood in front of her, wearing surprisingly fewer layers than usual. As Elly arched her back and stretched her arms above her head, trying to pull her stiff muscles to attention, she noticed another chair across from her, on the other side of Euden's bed. Ieyasu's usual decorations lay draped over the chair, the fur of his ornamental pig crawling along the back.

When Elly finally set her focus back on Ieyasu, she found him watching her patiently, but with unnerving intensity. "Did something happen?"

He shook his head, glancing over his shoulder to where Euden slept still. "Nothing has changed, but Cleo told me you wished to be woken at sunrise before she went back to her room.

"It's not exactly sunrise," Elly said petulantly, knowing it was unfair to get worked up about what couldn't have been more than an extra half hour of sleep.

Ieyasu shrugged, unfazed by either her question or the bitterness behind it. "I imagine you needed the extra sleep. No one else stayed here overnight."

Elly bristled. "I couldn't leave the Prince like this."

"And so you haven't. Please don't feel as if you need to explain your reasoning to me. Sazanka and Addis have acted much the same, at times when I am sick or injured. No matter if it is not something I wish them to do, it is a poor lord who cannot acknowledge both his own wishes and the desires of those who serve him.

"Uh, right," Elly said, settling back into her chair and stretching her legs out in front of her. "So why are you here then? Have you been here all night?"

Ieyasu nodded. "Though I would... thank you to not to let Sazanka and Addis know that I did not sleep. Or Botan for that matter. I may respect their desire to look after me, but I would rather not encourage undue concern. As to why I'm here? I wished to speak with you. I have questions, and perhaps some answers, though I'm afraid they are not all pleasant ones."

Elly’s breath caught in her throat. "Not pleasant? What does that mean? Do you know what happened to Euden?"

"My apologies, Elisanne, that was unfair of me to say. I'm afraid I'm not very good at broaching topics such as these."

"Is that why you ran away from your best friend instead of telling her you were giving part of your soul to a dragon?"

Rubbing the back of his neck, Ieyasu looked away for the first time in the conversation. "Ah... perhaps." He cleared his throat, then walked over to his chair, pulling it around to Elly’s side of the bed and sitting down. Reluctantly, Elly stood and rotated her chair to face him. "Let me try this again. Can you tell me about what happened last night? You were the only one at the Prince's side when he was hurt."

Another slap in the face. Not that Ieyasu meant it like that, clearly. Still, he was right that Elly had been the only one there, which meant that it had been her responsibility to protect Euden from... whatever it was that had happened. She sighed. This wasn't the time to think about that.

"We had heard rumors that Zethia was no longer on the throne. I don't know why she was let go, other than to trap us, but there was news of a transport that had headed out to some ruins near the sealing chambers, and we believed there was a chance that Zethia was being held there. And Euden wanted to - well, none of us said no either, even if we all knew it was dangerous."

Both Ieyasu and Elly looked over to the other bed as Elly paused to gather her thoughts. Zethia had slept fitfully most of the trip back, even if she didn't seem to be hurt the same way Euden was. Ieyasu looked back to Elly, and inclined his head towards the bed. "Whatever else, it does seem as if you were correct about that much."

"Yes," Elly sighed. "We were correct about it being a trap too, of course. There were fiends, though... We can fight fiends. Once we got inside the ruins, the ambush closed around behind us. We'd been prepared for something like that, even if it was a hard fight. Luca got separated from the group, and by the time we made it to him he was pretty hurt, so Euden decided that Cleo would stay with him while we fought our way to the other side of the room.

"We could... see Zethia. She was hanging from the ceiling by her arms, unconscious. It... wasn't pretty. There was some rubble nearby, and I was able to climb up to her while Euden waited below. He'd have to catch her after I loosened the chains; it was the only way we could get out of there fast enough. But it should have been him climbing up to free her, not me. I don't know why I let him stay alone down there, he could have..."

"But it was not a fiend that did this, was it?"

"No." Elly bit her lip. "No, it wasn't. When I freed one of her arms, we realized there was something else. A necklace." Squeezing her eyes closed, Elly tried to keep the picture our her her head, tried to fight off the wave of terror and nausea at the memory of Zethia dangling partly by her neck while Euden begged Elly to help. "The necklace was suspended by a gemstone. So I-"

She'd done what she'd been told. What she had to do. She'd done the only thing she could. "I smashed it. And something came out. It was horrible, like a snake or a worm or something, but pure black, like it was made of ink. It went straight for Euden." Another horrifying image. Another failure. "It buried itself into his chest. He started screaming, and then just collapsed."

Ieyasu frowned. "What happened to the fiends? He doesn't have many physical injuries."

Elly shook her head. "As soon as the gem shattered, the flow of them lessened." She didn't add that it was only by this small mercy that Euden was still alive at all. She'd been frozen from the second she heard Euden's scream, completely useless as she watched from above. Later, she had realized that it hadn't been something to celebrate. Any enemy like the Other didn’t back off unless it already had what it wanted. In the moment though, her hands shaking as she tried to finish getting Zethia down, she had felt nothing but relief as the tides of fiends lessened, and Cleo and Luca were able to make their way over.

Letting out a shaky breath, Elly continued. "I freed Zethia with Cleo's help, and then we found our way back out. Cleo tried to heal Euden, but she didn’t know what had happened to him. She says it's familiar, but foggy. But you..."

Ieyasu inclined his head. "I might have an idea. It is only a hunch, but Marishiten seems to believe it true."

"Marishiten? Why?"

"Dragons tend to have a sense of each other's presence, particularly dragons of the same element. When Zodiark left last night, she reached out to me. I believe she... felt great sorrow from Zodiark. It pained him to leave."

"Oh." A shiver passed through Elly, another prick of dread. "Why did he leave, then?"

"I believe he did so to protect Euden. It would have been far more painful for both of them to stay together. To stay bound by their pact."

"Wait, what?" The room felt suddenly too small, too quiet. Outside the window, the breeze caught at the bare branches of a nearby tree and drummed them against the window. Inside, the two youngest children of the throne slept. Elly bit her lip, trying to calm herself. Her fingers dug into the arms of the chair. "Just like that? The pact is broken?"

There was silence, as Ieyasu seemed to gather his thoughts. "Can I tell you a story?"

Elly felt a retort curl up in her mouth, but she swallowed it back down. He was trying to help, even if his calm was infuriating. "Yes, sure."

"There was once a thirteenth wyrmclan that ruled alongside the other twelve. They were the clan of the cat, clever as they were strong. Their ruler fiercely loved her people, though they had fallen on difficult times. Something had twisted the mana of the nearby river, and fiends had begun to attack fishermen and travelers. Over time, they became even bolder, venturing into the cities and towns. One day, one of the fishing villages at the edge of the territory was wiped out completely, and the ruler decided that she could no longer afford to simply defend her land. She had to take the fight to the source of the problem - the corrupted mana spring.

"So she led her retinue to the source of that river, a lake within a once beautiful grove that had become dark and cruel, grown over by twisted trees and thorns. The fiends had grown wilder and stronger, and at the center of the grove was a fiend unlike any she had ever seen before. Nonetheless, she led her people into the fight, knowing that her clan was doomed if she could not face this threat. 

“The people she lead that day were dear friends, and the ruler of the cat clan was clever as well as brave. So, as they fought, she commanded her forces carefully, sending her friends around the edges of the grove, pushing back the fiends around either side of the lake. Neither fiend nor human realized what she had done until she acted.

"The brave ruler sprung forward, calling upon the power of the dragon she shared her soul with, and they charged the monstrous fiend at the center of the lake. It was a brutal fight, and both the ruler and the dragon knew that she could not win through force alone. Instead, she fought the creature back towards the mana spring, and used the power of that mana to trap the fiend in another dimension."

Elly nodded at that, happy to finally hear something she understood. "Yes, we've encountered creatures like that, ones who were sealed away." 

"I thought you might be familiar. Though she knew the creature would be back some day, the ruler also knew that this would keep her people safe, and it would prevent her friends from sacrificing themselves in battle."

"But?"

Ieyasu smiled sadly. "But the mana spring was corrupted, and by drawing on that power, the ruler let that corruption spread to her own soul."

"What... what happened to her?"

"No one had seen such an affliction before, a blight upon the very soul. They had no idea how to help her. It is only with the wisdom of hindsight that we understand what had happened. For it was not the ruler herself, but her soulpact, that had been corrupted. And that corruption spread not just to her, but to the dragon she had bound herself to."

"So did they break the pact? Did the dragon leave?"

Shaking his head, Ieyasu looked out the window, his eyes distant. "The dragon loved the ruler fiercely. They stayed by each other's side until the very end, despite the pain it caused them both."

"But why? If they had broken the pact, wouldn't that have saved them?"

"No. The ruler's soul was already corrupted. Besides, a soul pact cannot be broken the same way one can be with those of your royal family. It would have only killed her sooner."

"And the dragon?"

"They would have lived. There have been... more instances of this sort of illness, in the years since. Those whose soulpact becomes corrupted are expected to break it, so the dragon they are bound with may live on."

A spluttering rage pinched at Elly's throat as she pushed back against the urge to cry. "So that's why Zodiark left? To save himself? He abandoned Euden just so he wouldn't be affected by this sickness?"

"I don't think so. I don't know that he even fully understood what had happened. As I said, the corruption causes more pain to those bound by the pact when they are together. Perhaps his he hoped that by leaving, he could give Euden the space he needed to get help."

"Still, surely he could have left without completely breaking the pact."

"Perhaps, perhaps not. I'm not familiar with the bonds between them. I do think it was done more to protect Euden than to save himself."

"How do you know?"

"Marishiten has broken a soulpact, just once. She... has not told me much of it, but I know she is not one to abandon a companion in their fight. I believe it is not a pain she will soon forget. I think that is what she recognized in Zodiark. I think that is why she knew what had happened."

It was true that after Zodiark had left, Euden had seemed to rest much easier. He had been feverish and pained the entire trip back to the Halidom, barely conscious long enough to ask if Zethia was alright. Now, at least, he was sleeping properly, not tossing and turning and half delirious.

"Does that mean that he'll be okay now? Since the pact is broken?"

"Truthfully, I do not know. But I suspect it is not so simple as that."

"I don't imagine it would be." Without thinking, Elly reached out to grab Euden's hand, folding it gently between her own. "There has to be something though. We need him. I - I can't have just failed. Euden has the blood of the royal family, it might be different."

"Elisanne..."

Elly glared at Ieyasu. "He just got his sister back. He's fought so hard for all of us. You can't expect me to just accept this."

Ieyasu's eyes locked with Elly's, more focused and sincere than they had been a second ago. "No. I am... used to accepting death as a part of my duty. But I don't think you are wrong to fight for him, even if I don't know where you could possibly start."

"Will you help?"

"If I can."

Elly searched his face for any hint of clear emotion. She'd always found Ieyasu hard to read. He was kind, and she did not doubt that he was truthful most of the time, but he was so practiced at hiding his feelings, so unlike Euden. Even when Euden denied her help, Elly could always tell when he needed it. Maybe that was the difference between being the seventh in line, and growing up knowing you would be called on to offer up your soul. If so, Elly was glad that Euden had spent most of his life with only a vague sense of the responsibility. 

"So, what will happen next?"

"If the corruption remains, I imagine it will spread to the next most recent pact that was made."

"That'll be Jupiter." Elly huffed. "I'm sure he won't stick around long if so. Self-centered bag of feathers." Stopping for a moment, Elly looked down and realized she had been rubbing her thumb over the back of Euden's hand. She blushed and stopped the motion, though she didn't let go of his hand. "Can I have a moment? I'll meet you outside."

"Outside? Where are we going?"

"Other people need to know about this. Cleo and Luca, at least, and Ranzal. Goddess, but he's going to be mad he wasn't there. And we should talk to the other Greatwyrms. If they are in danger, they deserve to know."

"And the Prince?"

"I'll make sure someone comes to wait with him and Zethia. But I'm not going to do either of them any good just sitting here."

With a slight inclination of his head, Ieyasu got to his feet. "Very well. Take whatever time you need. I will be waiting outside."

Only once Elly had heard the door shut did she let herself cry. Curled forward in her chair, she touched her forehead to Euden's hand, taking some small comfort in its warmth. It wasn't fair. He and Zethia had only ever wanted to help their people. They had been so kind to her, so brave, and how had the world repaid them? How had  _ she _ repaid them?

"If there's an answer somewhere out there," Elly whispered, fighting to keep her voice calm, "I'll find it. I'll make sure both of you can live happily and bring peace back to Alberia. No matter what it takes."

Elly let herself stay like that a moment longer, trying to steady her breathing. Then she straightened, quickly wiping her eyes and blinking back the rest of her tears. It wouldn't fool Ieyasu, but he wouldn't ask. She began to stand, and then froze as she heard the door creak.

"My apologies, I didn't-" The voice hesitated. "Are you okay?"

Turning, Elly saw Sinoa standing in the doorway, clutching at a bundle of papers. She looked away as Elly met her eyes, taking a sudden interesting in her papers. "Did you need something?"

"I was hoping to talk with the Auspex. Is she awake yet?"

"She is not."

"And the Prince? Well, I guess I can see that. No matter, I'll just, um. Wait." Sinoa glanced up, briefly catching Elly's befuddled stare before looking away again. " _ Are _ you okay though?"

"I'll be fine. There are things I need to go take care of. If either of them wake, please send word." Elly stared a moment longer, shaking her head slightly at the odd coincidence of Sinoa's timing. Finally standing up, Elly squeezed past Sinoa, who only slightly shuffled out of the way as she passed.

"Well, just be careful."

"What?" Elly turned around again. Sinoa was half-turned to face her, one hand raised to fiddle with her monocle.

"Be careful. I'm sure neither of them would want you to push yourself too hard."

"Right. I'll try to keep that in mind."

What an odd woman.


	4. Chapter 4

The room was quiet for a long minute after the door clicked shut behind Elly, long enough that Zethia wondered if she really was alone. She did not open her eyes, but she tried to keep her breathing shallow and soft, straining to hear any signs of movement or life.

"Auspex?" Zethia stopped breathing altogether at the sound of her title. The stranger's voice was hesitant, unsure but not confused. When they spoke again, it was more confident. "You do realize that not breathing is not usually something that people do when they are asleep, right? Well, sometimes they do, which isn't good, but usually not in response to someone trying to get their attention."

Carefully, Zethia peeled open one eye, squinting against the bright room. The stranger still stood near the door, seemingly not having moved since her conversation with Elly. She gave Zethia a cautious smile upon catching her looking over, and even raised one hand to wave. Zethia smiled weakly back, then closed her eyes again, still unaccustomed to such a bright room, and sank back into her pillow. "Who are you?"

There was the sound of shuffling and the scrape of a chair. "My name is Sinoa. I've been staying here at the Halidom for a few months now, aiding your brother. The Prince."

Several questions bubbled up at this, but Zethia's instincts for politeness won out over them all. "It's good to meet you, Sinoa. Though you can just call me Zethia." After a second, she added, "I'm sure Euden would feel the same."

"Oh, well, yes. I just find sometimes it's easier to rely on titles, especially when I don't know people very well." A pause. "It can be hard to keep track of who is okay with being called what, especially at a university where some of the professors are very stodgy."

"You study at a university?"

Another pause. "Yes, well... I _was_ studying at one. It's a bit of a story, but maybe one for later?"

Extracting a sore arm from underneath her nest of blankets, Zethia rubbed at her face. "Yes, probably." She sighed. "I just don't know where to start."

"You don't really have to say anything, if you don't want to. I just had a feeling that you might need some company."

Zethia cracked an eye open again, looking over to Sinoa. Between her colorful clothes - a vibrant mix of blue, orange, and pink - and her sparkling adornments, it looked as if she might have been decorated by a magpie. Her strawberry-blonde hair was more or less tied back, though even that seemed to only go a little way to tame the mass of it that curled every which way. She sat fully on the chair she had pulled over, arms wrapped around her knees while her feet were crossed in front of her on the chair.

"That's quite a feeling to have about someone you've never met before."

"The, uh... Someone asked me to?"

"If you aren't going to tell the truth, I'd prefer you just leave us to silence."

Puffing out her cheeks, Sinoa shuffled through the papers she had set on the table next to her. "I'm not exactly lying. Someone did ask me to come check on you. It's just complicated."

Zethia watched her fidget for a while, glancing over occasionally before quickly looking away. Eventually, when Zethia still didn't respond, Sinoa pulled a few papers off the top of her stack and began looking through them properly, instantly immersed in her work. She adjusted her position and grabbed a book from the pile, propping it open and leaning it precariously against the lamp on the table, then started writing. Zethia felt a twinge of unease watching her settle in so easily, like she shouldn't let the conversation end unresolved, that it was her responsibility to say more - to explain herself, or make Sinoa explain herself, or anything to fill the silence. But the silence was nice.

Surprisingly, the company was, too. Zethia trusted her brother's instincts, even when others didn't. Sinoa wouldn't be here if she meant harm to either of them. So Zethia let her eyes wander, watching the lump in the other bed that she knew to be Euden, the tuft of blond hair visible over Sinoa's elbow. He didn't look sick. He just looked like he was sleeping.

The memories Zethia had of her time with the Other were foggy, though the memory of it leaving her was painfully sharp. _You will be the Prince's undoing, one way or another,_ it told her, smiling coldly from Emile's face. Emile's face, Emile's smile, but those same eyes. _You've served me well, dear Auspex. I'm sure Ilia would be proud._

Unthinkingly, Zethia raised her hand to her neck as she thought of it. The necklace was gone, of course. She was awake now. Whatever it was that had been inside was in Euden now.

"Is he going to die?" Zethia didn't take her eyes off Euden as she spoke, watching the shallow rise and fall of his shape as he slept.

Sinoa started, frowning for a minute while she processed what Zethia had said. "I don't really know."

"But you do know something, don't you? You must, if you are here. You must know something about this curse, and the dragons, and Zodiark, and that he's... dying."

"I don't, really. I'm sorry. She just said-"

Zethia's attention snapped to Sinoa. "Who did?"

"I don't... she told me that you wouldn't want to know."

It wasn't hard for Zethia to guess what Sinoa meant by that. She was one of the last things Zethia remembered clearly - the other her. The her from the future, the one who'd hurt Euden and told them they were making a mistake, time and again. Zethia's hand tightened around the blanket by her neck, her fingers digging into it. "She was right. I don't."

Sinoa tapped her pencil against her leg, clearly conflicted. "She just said that you shouldn't be alone right now."

"I'm _not_ alone," Zethia snapped, angry at her own harsh words even as she spoke them. "Euden's here." After a second, she added, "I don't even _know_ you."

"I know." Sinoa's voice was quiet. "I'm sorry. Sarisse and Ranzal have been busy trying to keep things calm, Luca's hurt, Cleo's still resting, Elly doesn't even know about the other Zethia yet, so I just thought... I thought I would be better than nothing. I'm sorry. I'm not very good at this."

"No," Zethia said, "no, I'm sorry." Carefully, she relaxed her hand, forcing herself to breath. "You are trying to help me, and I shouldn't take my feelings out on you."

"You don't have to talk to me about it, if you don't want to. But please, Auspex. Zethia. If there's anything I can do for you."

Carefully, Zethia sat herself up, trying not to get frustrated with how slow the process was. She wasn't exactly hurt anywhere, but it felt like every part of her took twice as long to do what she wanted it to do. Like her body wasn't used to her anymore. "I want a room, somewhere in the castle. Overlooking the Halidom. I want to be able to see what he's built. And then I want to know what's happened. All of it. And... I don't want to see her. But you could tell her thank you, for me."

Fishing around for a pen, Sinoa scribbled down a few notes, stopping with the pen still held above the paper, waiting for more.

"Do you... do you know if Euden is going to wake up any time soon?"

"I don't know," Sinoa said hesitantly, "though I can try to ask, if you'd like."

"No. No, I think I'd just like to wait here with him. Knowing wouldn't change that."

* * *

Once Sinoa left, things became decidedly more busy in the small house that was Zethia's temporary home. With word being out that she was awake, people wanted to check on her, comfort her, ask her questions... or do their best to stop too many people from doing just that, in Ranzal's case. He had bumbled into her room, bleary-eyed but smiling, and insisted it taking up a post at the door.

"I just don't want people bothering ya too much, Auspex. I know it's all meant well, but it's a nosy bunch here, even at the best of times, and it's been a pretty crazy 24 hours."

"How many people exactly are living here?"

Ranzal scratched his head, then fiddled with the bit of hair hanging over his eyes as he mulled over her question over. "More than a hundred I'd say. Maybe two hundred? If you count refugees and the like. Less if you only mean permanent residents, and less still if you mean the people who've pledged themselves to help Euden. It's still small, if you ask a city guy like me, but we get more arrivals every day it seems like."

When Zethia had been traveling with the hodge-podge group, there had been a few friends they'd picked up, but it was on a scale that could be counted on her hands, not multiple hundreds. "I'm not surprised that so many people would come. Even if he didn't know it, Euden always was good at inspiring people."

Ranzal grinned at her. "Seems like that runs in the family."

"Maybe," Zethia acknowledged with a tilt of her head, "but it's taken me a lot of work to learn how to be the Auspex. When I was younger, all I did was hide behind Euden and our mom. He's a natural leader."

"Well, maybe so, but there's nothing wrong with working at learning something. I didn't pop into the world already knowing how to swing an axe around, after all."

Zethia laughed at that, shaking her head. "Okay, I'll give you that one."

Aside from Ranzal, most everyone that visited only stayed for a short while. Even Notte, bundle of energy that she was, kept her visit brief. She gave Zethia a small kiss on the forehead, promising that she’d "share the _heck_ out of all our adventures," and zipped out not long after, leaving Zethia with the distinct impression that someone had made a point to lecture the fairy about not trying to catch her up all at once.

As for everyone else, though they all made the excuse of wanting to give Zethia space to recover, she thought that they all looked like they could use the rest as much as she did. Even Ranzal, Ilia bless him, dozed off for a while by midafternoon, startling Zethia out of her contemplations with loud snoring.

Sometime as the sun was setting, Sarisse came by with food, enough for Ranzal and herself as well as Zethia, along with a fresh loaf of bread and some fruit that she set aside for Euden. She was much the same as Zethia remembered her - bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, so to speak. She chatted away as the three of them ate, relating the story of how she came to stay at the Halidom permanently, leaving her people to their own care.

"It wasn't easy," Sarisse admitted, when Zethia asked her about leaving her village. "To be honest, I still feel bad about it sometimes. What kind of leader am I supposed to be if I up and leave the people I'm supposed to be protecting? But the way Euden talks about it, it's not just one group of people that he has to worry about. Otherwise, he'd just hole himself up inside that stuffy castle and never come out. Except he has to think about all his people, and even those outside of the kingdom who are being hurt by the Empire. That's the kind of leader I want to be like."

"I didn't know you were so interested in being a leader, Sarisse."

Sarisse blushed, rubbing the back of her head sheepishly. "It's kind of a new thing, really. Luca asked me what I really wanted to do with myself, and, well, that's what I came up with. Took me a little while to get there of course, but now that I've decided, I'm sticking to it."

Ranzal beamed down at Sarisse, giving her a heavy couple of pats on the back. "And we're all behind you, kid. It's a good dream, even if I do find all that stuff a little nauseating."

"At least Sylvan chiefs don't generally have to squeeze themselves in all those stuffy clothes that humans do. I can't blame you for not wanting anything to do with that."

Looking between the two of them, Zethia chewed on her lip. She must not have hidden her confusion well, because when Sarisse looked back over her eyes widened in amusement. "Oh, that's right, you don't know, do you Zethia? Turns out our Mr. Mercenary here is actually a secret prince or whatever."

"I'm no such thing," Ranzal said dryly. "Just the son of some stick in the mud noble who likes stuffy clothes too much."

"A noble who also happens to like, _run_ a whole _town_."

Ranzal waved a hand at Sarisse. "It's not as big of a deal as she makes it out to be, I swear."

"Well," Zethia said, trying to choose her words carefully, "if it's not something that means much to you Ranzal, it's not something that you need to talk about."

"Still," Sarrise said. "A noble. Pretty crazy."

"Maybe a hair."

"How exactly did this all come up, anyways?"

Ranzal rolled his eyes, finishing up his last bite of food. "We paid old pops a visit, looking for some support for the Halidom, back up in case something goes wrong, that sort of thing. Besides, we can't actually take in _every_ refugee here, and it's not exactly the safest place in the world."

"So it really is war then, isn't it?" The room felt instantly quieter at Zethia's remark, and both Sarisse and Ranzal, for a moment, didn't meet her eye.

"I don't know what else I'd call it," Ranzal said after a bit. "I mean, it's strange, because we go about our lives day to day and sometimes it seems like everything is fine. There's so much that happens here, what with the dragons and the new arrivals and - did I mention there was a circus once? And we've saved a bunch of villages, ya know, just generally heroic kind of stuff, that's us."

Toying with his fork, Ranzal glanced over to Sarisse, who still had her eyes on her lap. "But yeah, it's a war. We all know that things are only going to get worse. Heck, we don't even know what the Other has planned, in the long run, but whatever it is, it sure isn't going to be fun. We just don't like to talk about it, all the time."

"Honestly," Sarrise said, seeming to jump back into the conversation out of nowhere, "honestly I think it was easier to focus on things like finding you. Or other smaller things, like Ranzal said. Not that it's exactly been all small things. I think we saved the world a few times? But you know, from other things. Less Other-y things. If that makes any sense."

Zethia nodded, her face somber. "It does. I'm sure it hasn't been easy, to have to... Well. Euden has lost a lot. His kingdom. His father." She only added in her own head, _me_. "He has always been at his happiest when he is helping other people. I suppose in that sense, the small things must help you to remember that you are making a difference."

Euden still slept in the partial shadows of the other side of the room, unmoving. Cleo had said he did seem better, when she visited earlier. He was sleeping more soundly, and well on his way to recovering, at least from his visible wounds. She had guessed that he would be up tomorrow, though she couldn't say for sure. Whatever Ieyasu knew, whatever Cleo and Elly and the rest might now know, they hadn't found the time to share it with Zethia.

She wished she remembered more about what had happened over the past months since she'd been taken by the Other. She wished she'd heard more of what Ieyasu had said about what he believed was wrong with her brother. She wish she'd been there for his birthday. Their birthday.

"How did you find out where I was?"

"Well, I can't remember exactly," Ranzal started, scrunching up his face in what was probably supposed to be a thoughtful expression, "someone saw some Imperial activity by some ruins, that sorta thing? We knew they were guarding something there, didn't know what. But we all hoped it was you."

"You had to know it was a trap though, right? That I wouldn't be left out in the open just like that, that the Other would never let me go if it didn't have something else in mind?" Zethia's voice was raised - not to a shout, but no longer a calm, peaceful note.

"I mean, yeah," Ranzal said quietly. "Of course we did."

Zethia didn't have to say more than that, so she didn't. It wasn't a conversation anyone in the room wanted to have, and they all knew how it would go. _You shouldn't have come_ , Zethia would say. _You should have kept him safe_.

And then they would point out that this was Euden she was talking about, and that would be the end of that.

Sarisse fiddled with one of her ears, distractedly running one of her fingers down the back of it. "Does it help at all to know that we've gone into, like, a lot of really obvious traps before?"

"You know, honestly?" Zethia smiled at her. "It kind of does."

With the tension eased, if not broken, the conversation drifted back to easier topics - questions about why Euden had so many would-be assassins and thieves at the castle, or how petty the dragons got over dragonfruit. It was only when Sarisse was preparing to leave that Zethia worked up the nerve to ask the other question that had been nagging at her all day.

"Do you know if... has Elly been busy with something today? I don't mean to impose on her, but I was wondering if she was... going to come by."

That wasn't entirely true. Elly had been by already. Zethia had a feeling she had been waiting by Euden's bed all night. She simply hadn't come by once Zethia was awake.

"I'm not really sure," Sarisse hedged. "I mean, things around here have been absolutely bonkers, and she's been putting a lot on herself. Cleo might have just sent her to bed."

"And she was kind of hurt," Ranzal added. "And I think she walked the whole perimeter of the Halidom at one point, to check that we are well-defended. She might not even have heard that you're awake."

 _Or maybe she didn't want to see me_ , Zethia thought to herself, trying to keep her face passive. _After everything I've done_.

To Ranzal and Sarisse, she merely inclined her head gracefully. "In that case, I will have to pray to Ilia that someone has finally made her get some rest. Goddess only knows, I'm sure she needs it."

Ranzal clapped Zethia on the back. "I'm sure you do, too. It's great to catch up and all, but Cleo'll have my hide if I keep you up too long."

After the others left, in the quiet of the suddenly dark room, Zethia tried not to dwell on the whispered words that she hadn't quiet been able to make out. What had that been to Elly? A prayer? A vow? An apology?

A confession?

Curled up on her side, Zethia missed, for the first time in a long time, the nights when she and Euden would crawl into their mom's bed. Usually it was after one of the twins had a nightmare, but sometimes it was just because they were lonely, or couldn't sleep, or just because they loved each other. Their mother had never made them explain why, if they hadn't wanted to talk about it.

After her mother had died, Zethia had stopped crawling into other beds, but she'd often missed the feeling of a hand brushing out her hair, or a soft voice telling her there was nothing to be afraid of.

Back then, it had been her mother she had missed. Tonight, she thought, she would have given anything only just to hold Euden's hand.


End file.
